The Lord’s Supper Explained: The Historic Anglican View of the Sacrament—Part 2

Read Part 1.

By Robin G. Jordan

A third catechism that made a significant contribution to the historic Anglican understanding of the Lord’s Supper was John Calvin’s The Catechism of the Church of Geneva, also known as Calvin’s Genevan Catechism. Calvin prepared two catechisms, one in 1537 and the other in 1542. Calvin prepared the first catechism for the instruction of children in the Reformed faith. However, the first catechism proved too difficult for children and Calvin was forced to revise it. Calvin arranged the second catechism in a question and answer format to make its contents easier to understand. The second catechism was translated into Latin in 1545 and then into English in 1556 and was used in the two English universities and to a lesser extent in English grammar schools. Calvin’s Genevan Catechism would contribute to the historic Anglican understanding of the Lord’s Supper in two ways.

First, the Genevan Catechism would influence the thinking of Englishmen who read and studied the catechism. If they already held Reformed view, the Genevan Catechism would reinforce those views. Second, the Genevan Catechism would reinforce the thinking of the Heidelberg theologians that prepared the Heidelberg Catechism and the thinking of Dean Alexander Nowell who prepared a catechism of his own, the Larger Catechism. The Genevan Catechism would also furnish material for the Heidelberg Catechism and Nowell’s Catechism.

 Nowell’s Larger Catechism is based upon a catechism that is attributed to Bishop John Ponet, a English Protestant churchman and the most senior in rank of the Marian exiles, and which was appended to the 42 Articles of Religion of 1553. This catechism did not see use since Edward VI died in the same year and his older sister, Mary, a staunch Roman Catholic, ascended the throne.

In 1815 Rev. Elijah Waterman, an American Congregationalist pastor and scholar, published a new translation of Calvin’s Latin catechism of 1545. The Rev. Waterman concluded from a comparison of Calvin’s Latin catechism with Dean Nowell’s Latin catechism that in a number of places Dean Nowell had borrowed language from Calvin’s Latin catechism. The two catechisms were in agreement not only in doctrine but also in word. Waterman further concluded that the similarity of the two catechisms showed that Calvin and the Reformed Church of England shared a common Reformed theology.

In 1562 Nowell laid the catechism before Convocation of which he was prolocutor of the Lower House. In the Upper House four bishops who are believed to have been Bishops John Jewel, William Alley, Thomas Bentham, and Richard Davies corrected the catechism. After the bishops corrected the catechism, it passed the review of both Houses and had their full approbation, Nowell then submitted the catechism to Elizabeth I’s Secretary of State William Cecil who returned the catechism to Nowell after a year with the notes of a number of “learned gentlemen” whom had reviewed the catechism for Cecil. Nowell adopted the changes that they had recommended. It was five or six years before Archbishop Matthew Parker obtained Cecil’s permission to publish the catechism. The catechism was then sent to the printer’s.

Calvin’s view of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper is summed up in these questions and answers from his 1560 reformulation of the Genevan Catechism.

353. Do we have in the Supper simply the testimony of the things already mentioned, or are they truly given to us in it?

See that Jesus Christ is the Truth, there can be no doubt that the promises which He made at the Supper, are actually fulfilled in it, and that what He figures in it is made true. Thus in accordance with what He promises and represents in the Sacrament, I do not doubt that He makes us partakers of His very substance, in order to unite us with Himself in one life.

354. But how can this be, when the body of Jesus Christ is in heaven, and we are pilgrims on this earth?

By the incomprehensible power of His Spirit, who conjoins things separated by distance.

355. You do not think, then, either that the body is enclosed in the bread, or the blood in the chalice?

No. On the contrary, in order to have the reality of the Sacraments, we must lift up our hearts on high to heaven, where Jesus Christ is in the glory of His Father, from whence we expect Him in our redemption, and do not seek Him in these corruptible elements.

356. You understand, then, that there are two things in this Sacrament, material bread and wine, which we see by the eye, handle by the hands, and perceive by the taste, and Jesus Christ by whom our souls are inwardly nourished?

Yes, but in such a way that we have in it also a testimony and a kind of pledge for the resurrection of our bodies, in that they are made partakers in the sign of life.

In the nineteenth century the Tractarians would claim that the Prayer Book Catechism taught the Real Objective Presence in the consecrated bread and wine. The doctrine of the Real Objective Presence is the belief that Christ is really or substantively present in the consecrated elements. The Tractarians based this claim upon the wording of one of the questions and answers in the section on the sacraments and their interpretation of John Overall’s view of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.

Question. What is the inward part, or thing signified?

Answer. The body and blood of Christ, which are verily and indeed taken and received by the faithful in the Lord's Supper.

John Overall who succeeded Nowell as the Dean of St. Paul’s condensed the Prayer Book Catechism's section on sacraments from Nowell’s Catechism. Overall’s view of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper may be gleaned from Praelectiones seu Disputationes de Patrum et Christi anima et de Antichristo.

In the Sacrament of the Eucharist or the Lord’s Supper the body and blood of Christ, and therefore the whole Christ, are indeed really present, and are really received by us, and are really united to the sacramental signs, as signs which not only signify but also convey, so that in the right use of the Sacrament, and to those who receive worthily, when the bread is given and received, the body of Christ is given and received; and when the wine is given and received, the blood of Christ is given and received; and therefore the whole Christ is communicated in the Communion of the Sacrament. Yet this is not in a carnal, gross, earthly way by Transubstantiation or Consubstantiation, or any like fictions of human reason, but in a way mystical, heavenly, and spiritual, as is rightly laid down in our Articles.

Overall’s interpretation of Article XXVIII is the key to his view of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. In contrast to the then prevailing Reformed view of the sacrament, Overall ties Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper closely to the consecrated bread and wine. At the same time he seeks to remain within the bounds set by the Articles of Religion. While maintaining that “the whole Christ is communicated in the Communion of the Sacrament,” Overall does not explain what he means. This leaves his view of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper open to all kinds of misinterpretation.

Overall, like Lancelot Andrewes, was an early High Churchman. They both had a high view of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper which, while tying Christ’s presence closely to the consecrated elements denied any change in the substance of the bread and wine. Andrewes in his disputation with Cardinal Bellamine writes:

Christ said, “This is My body”. He did not say, “This is My body in this way”. We are in agreement with you as to the end; the whole controversy is as to the method. As to the “This”, we hold with firm faith that it is. As to the “this is in this way” (namely, by the Transubstantiation of the bread into the body), as to the method whereby it happens that it is, by means of In or With or Under or By transition there is no word expressed. And because there is no word, we rightly make it not of faith; we place it perhaps among the theories of the school, but not among the articles of the faith. … We believe no less than you that the presence is real. Concerning the method of the presence, we define nothing rashly, and, I add, we do not anxiously inquire, any more than how the blood of Christ washes us in Baptism, any more than how the human and divine natures are united in one Person in the Incarnation of Christ

Overall and Andrewes represent a second strand in historic Anglicanism, which is associated with the Caroline High Churchmen and which departs from what was the prevailing Reformed view of the time, that  is, Christ is truly and spiritually present in the Lord’s Supper but his presence is not tied to the consecrated elements. The latter view (and not Overall and Andrewes’) form a part of what J. I. Packer describes as the “central theology” of the Articles of Religion, The Book of Common Prayer, and the two Books of Homilies.  

Among the purposes of the Articles of Religion is to provide doctrinal standards by which rites and services of The Book of Common Prayer, including the Prayer Book Catechism, must be interpreted. These doctrinal standards are Augustinian in regard to sin and Reformed in regard to the sacraments.

As we have seen in the first article in this series and in the preceding paragraphs, Nowell’s Catechism is Reformed in doctrine. The bishops and the Puritans at the 1604 Hampton Court Conference understood this section also to be Reformed in doctrine. The Puritans at the Savoy Conference fifty seven years later had the same understanding of the section on the sacraments. While the Puritans offered additions to the section, they had no objections to it.

In order to claim that the Prayer Book Catechism taught the Real Objective Presence in the consecrated elements, the Tractarians not only paid no attention to the received interpretation of the Articles of Religion but also did not take account of the historic context in which section on the sacraments was first authorized and subsequently reauthorized. John Henry Newman in Tract 90, Remarks on Certain Passages in the Thirty-Nine Articles, countenanced the disregard of authorial intent and historic context in the interpretation of the Articles, a practice that would characterizes Anglo-Catholic interpretation of the Prayer Book as well as the Articles. The Tractarians also misinterpreted Overall’s view of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. What they did was bend the facts to support their interpretation of the Prayer Book Catechism’s section on sacraments, a conclusion that both their nineteenth century critics and more recent scholars have drawn from their lectures, sermons, and writings.

As a safeguard against such misinterpretation the 1926 Irish Prayer Book Catechism added an additional question and answer.

Question.What is the inward part, or thing signified?

Answer. The Body and Blood of Christ, which are verily and indeed taken and received by the faithful in the Lord's Supper.

Question. After what manner are the Body and Blood of Christ taken and received in the Lord's Supper?

Answer. Only after a heavenly and, spiritual manner; and the mean whereby they are taken and received is Faith.

Note that the additional question and answer are taken word for word from the Articles of Religion.

In regard to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, two doctrinal strands are discernible in historic Anglicanism by the conclusion of the seventeenth century. Both strands respect the doctrinal boundaries set by the Articles of Religion. Both strands reject the idea that the Lord’s Supper is a bare memorial, a view associated with the Swiss Reformer Ulrich Zwingli. Both strands maintain that “to those who rightly, worthily, and with faith receive the Lord’s Supper, the bread which we break is a partaking of the body of Christ, and similarly the cup of blessing is a partaking of the blood of Christ.”Both strands deny that the bread and wine, when they are consecrated, undergo a change in substance. The consecrated elements retain their natural substance. The only changes in the consecrated elements that the two strands recognize are a change of dignity and a change of use. Both strands reject Luther’s view that the substance of Christ is intermixed with the substance of the bread and wine in the consecrated elements. Both strands maintain that “the Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten, in the Supper, only after a heavenly and spiritual manner.” The means by which the Body of Christ is received and eaten is faith. Both strands value frequent communion.

Where the two strands differ the most is their formulation of the faithful’s spiritual feeding upon Christ. The central strand posits that this spiritual feeding occurs concurrently with the eating and drinking of the consecrated elements but separately from their consumption. This formulation admits the view expressed in the 1559 Words of Administration, “The body of our lord Jesus Christ, which was given for thee, preserve thy body and soul into everlasting life: and take and eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee, feed on him in thine heart by faith, with thanksgiving,” and Richard Hooker’s Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, “The real presence of Christ’s most blessed body and blood is not therefore to be sought for in the sacrament, but in the worthy receiver of the sacrament.” It also admits the views expressed in Calvin’s Geneva Catechism, the Heidelberg Catechism, and Nowell’s Catechism.

The second strand, which Peter B. Nockles describes as the “Old High Church” strand, posits that eating and drinking of the consecrated elements and the partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ are tied to each other. When the faithful consume the consecrated bread and wine, they are in a mystical, spiritual, and heavenly manner partaking of Christ’s Body and Blood. How this occurs is a mystery. This formulation admits the view that the consecrated elements, while they retain their natural substance, become Christ’s Body and Blood in “virtue, power, and effect.” The Old High Church strand would influence John Wesley and Methodism.

In a separate article I am going to examine To Be a Christian: An Anglican Catechism, the Anglican Church in North America’s catechism, and what it teaches and permits to be taught in regards to the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. In my examination of the catechism I am going to employ criteria that J. I. Packer outlines in his 1961 critique of the then proposed revised catechism of the Church of England. Adopted in 1962, this catechism would replaced by a simplified catechism, The Pilgrim's Way, in 2017.